A MALACAÑANG official ridiculed Senator Miriam Defensor Santiago on Monday for allegedly taking a Facebook poll survey seriously.
“There is nothing in our election laws about FB elections,” presidential spokesman Edwin Lacierda said in a text message to reporters.
His message had a smiley face drawn at the end, signifying he was laughing at Santiago’s statement.
Santiago on Sunday said social media had led to an extraordinary change in the voting attitude among Filipinos because she had emerged as the netizens’ top choice for president in a Facebook-based poll.
“Social media is the key to winning the 2016 elections,” said Santiago who is running for president in 2016 under the People’s Reform Party.
She said traditional politicians could always pay for advertisements or even pre-election surveys, but no amount of money could silence Filipinos on social media.
The latest results of the survey on the Facebook page Pinoy History showed that 48.36 percent of the respondents wanted Santiago as president in 2016 despite the fact she is the only presidential aspirant who has yet to release campaign ads.
The bets bombarding the media with ads tailed Santiago: Davao City Mayor Rodrigo Duterte, 42.35 percent; former Interior Secretary Manuel Roxas II, 3.86 percent; Senator Grace Poe, 2.15 percent; and Vice President Jejomar Binay, 1.28 percent.
The group behind the survey claims the results show “the real score of candidates in the upcoming presidential elections.”
Since announcing her presidential bid in October, Santiago has not tapped the traditional media—radio, television or print—for ads in deference to election laws that limit the campaign period to Feb. 9 up to May 7.
In the 2009 Peñera v. Commission on Elections case, the Supreme Court ruled that the offense of premature campaigning has been decriminalized by R.A. 8436, or the New Poll Automation Law, as amended.
To reject the Peñera doctrine, Santiago has filed Senate Bill 2445, or the Anti-Premature Campaigning Bill, which seeks to prohibit candidates and even prospective candidates from campaigning a year before the elections.
“A protracted campaign period corrupts elected officials because it allows them to spend more and more money for ads. They are bound to steal that money back when they are in office,” Santiago said.
“In addition, sincere but poor candidates always lose their chance to serve the public to richer and more popular candidates. In the absence of a law that will break this cycle, social media is the equalizer.”
Despite not having ads, Santiago has consistently topped the online pre-election surveys. In a recent survey on the official Facebook fan page of the Polytechnic University of the Philippines, Santiago was chosen by some 64 percent of the 135,622 respondents.